Balinese man watches Mount Agung volcano almost covered with clouds as he stands at a temple in Karangasem, Bali, Indonesia, Tuesday, September 26, 2017. An increasing frequency of tremors from the volcano indicates magma is continuing to move toward the surface and an eruption is possible, a disaster agency official said Tuesday. Tourists are cutting short their stay to the island, where an eruption would force the airport to close and strand thousands. (Photo by Firdia Lisnawati/AP Photo)

Neon Naked Life Drawing in London, United Kingdom on August 23, 2022. Combining UV light and reactive body paints, Neon Naked brings an alternative, vibrant and psychedelic exploration to life drawing classes. (Photo by Guy Corbishley/Alamy Live News)

Participants attend the annual May bank holiday “Jack In The Green” parade and festival in Hastings, Britain, May 6, 2019. (Photo by Toby Melville/Reuters)

While communism, collectivism, worms, dry rot and casual looting failed to destroy the majestic wooden churches of Russia, it may be ordinary neglect that finally does them in. Dwindled now to several hundred remaining examples, these glories of vernacular architecture lie scattered amid the vastness of the world’s largest country. Just over a decade ago, Richard Davies, a British architectural photographer, struck out on a mission to record the fragile and poetic structures. Austerely beautiful and haunting, “Wooden Churches: Traveling in the Russian North” (White Sea Publishing; $132) is the result. Covering thousands of miles, Mr. Davies described how he and the writer Matilda Moreton tracked down the survivors from among the thousands of onion-domed structures built after Prince Vladimir converted to Christianity in 988.

Acrobat Indira Avila leaves the ring as performer Glenn Falco warms up backstage ahead of a dress rehearsal at the newly renovated Blackpool Tower Circus, in Blackpool, Britain, March 28, 2022. (Photo by Phil Noble/Reuters)

Tourists fly in hot air balloons over the west bank of the Nile River on January 9, 2025 in Luxor, Egypt. Luxor, which contains the historical city of Thebes, capital of ancient Egypt's pharaohs at the height of their power, is full of pharaonic monuments and other antiquities. (Photo by Ahmad Hasaballah/Getty Images)

A dog stands next to the body of an elderly woman killed inside a house in Bucha, outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Tuesday, April 5, 2022. (Photo by Felipe Dana/AP Photo)